The swimming events are over and Australia is about to begin its slide back down the medals table. But at least there is still statistical proof that Australia is the greatest sporting nation on earth.
"We're only a nation of 19 million people," is the common refrain, as the Olympic commentators note the US and China on top of the leader board, and a host of others jockeying for the minor placing.
But Australia seems destined to top at least one medals table at the end of this 16-day sporting extravaganza. The Australian Bureau of Statistics, possibly miffed that its dry economic data has been shunted off the front pages for the past two weeks, and possibly under instructions from the federal Government, has dedicated its website to the Olympic ideal, and its benefit for Australia.
The centrepiece is the bureau's medal tally by world population, which Australia topped in 1996 with Cuba.
By the end of day eight, Australia had whittled its way down to one medal for every 775,000 people. Its biggest threat appeared to come from Slovakia, which was dangerously poised at one for every million, and Cuba, which was struggling in 12th position at one for 2.2 million but still had the boxing and the high jump to come.
The United States was right out of contention with its 33 medals representing a medal for every 8 million. To beat Australia, the States would have to win about 400 pieces of gold, silver and bronze.
(India, incidentally, has a population-to-medal ratio of just over a billion.)
The bureau has some other useful data. "Sport and exercise take up time and often cost money," it notes gravely, before revealing that its 1997 time use survey indicated that Australians spent an average of 21 minutes a day playing sport (excluding fishing and underarm bowling).
But it doesn't come cheaply. The average amount of money a year by each participant in organised sport was $693, or around $5 an hour.
But is that enough to buy gold at the Olympics? Apparently not. According to a recent article by Kevin Norton, an associate professor of physical education, exercise and sports studies, and postgraduate student Kieran Hogan, it costs the Australian Government around $36 million to produce a gold medal.
That figure is based on federal funding of elite sports programmes over the past 20 years, which has produced a total of 115 medals before the Sydney Olympics. It equates to an average cost of $8 million.
On that basis, Australia will win four gold, 15 silver and 33 bronze in Sydney.
Congratulations to all, but is it money well spent? The elite funding programme in Australia was championed by the Labor Government that said in 1981 that the establishment of the Australian Institute of Sport would filter through to the grassroots.
The trickle-down effect, and the inspiration it would give "ordinary" Australians to "have a go," has been the basis of the continued funding. But according to this article, it is all to no avail.
It cited a New Zealand study which showed that the prowess of elite athletes may actually hinder rather than foster participation in sports by members of the public.
In Australia, the introduction of elite sporting programmes and increased success at the Olympics have coincided with a decline in physical activity and a dramatic increase in overweight and obesity levels.
Indeed, money and the Olympics produce some peculiar statistics.
If, as expected, Australia wins 62 medals at this competition, that will equate to a population:medals ratio of around 300,000. Divide the $36 million cost of a gold medal by the population:medal ratio, and you end up with $120 - the average price of a ticket to the Sydney Games.
It seems that one in 20 athletes gets paid to exercise, but there are three times as many people getting paid for supervising, coaching and organising the events these athletes take part in.
*Giles Parkinson is deputy editor of the Australian Financial Review.
<i>Sydney view:</i> Aussie gold put at $36m a medal
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